The Milnes branch starts with Marianne Milnes(8) who married Henry Briggs(7). My information on the Milnes family is at present very limited, though a four-generation pedigree of the Milnes family is given on p.3 of Davidson (1986), together with some notes on the family.
| Generation | Milnes Ancestor | Spouse | Date and place of marriage |
|---|---|---|---|
| O | Marianne Milnes(8) (1801-1886) | Henry Briggs(7) (1797-1868) | 03 Jun 1824 at Thornhill by Dewsbury, W. R. Yorks. |
| M | James Milnes(299) (1744-1803) | Mary Anne BELL(300) (1769-1858) | |
| L | Richard Milnes(1132) (1705?-1770 or 1776) | Martha Brook(1133) (d. 1763) | 03 Sep 1739 at Halifax. |
According to the diary of Alice Sophia Briggs (1917), Marianne Milnes (8) was born in 1801, the daughter of James Milnes(299) and Mary Ann Bell(300). There are IGI entries for her christening on 19 May 1801 at Flockton, with those parents. One entry is based on Flockton parish (chapelry) records, as transcribed by the Yorkshire Parish Record Society, the other is a member submission for which no source details are given. Marianne married Henry Briggs on 03 Jun 1824 at Thornhill by Dewsbury, the parish within which Flockton lay, and bore him three sons. For details of this family see the entry for Henry Briggs. According to an entry in the National Burials Index, Marianne was buried at Flockton on 07 Jun 1886.
All that Alice Sohpia Briggs (1919) has to say about James Milnes is that he married Mary Ann Bell, daughter of Archibald Bell of Edinburgh. Alice Sophia also presumes that this Milnes was a branch of Lord Houghton's family, as the crest was the same (not that this means anything to me). The chapter notes in Davidson (1986) indicate that James was one of four sons of Richard Milnes, and that he lived at the Manor House, Flockton. The brief pedigree given by Davidson (1986) gives his dates as 1744 to 1803. Davidson (1986) shows just two daughters of James and Mary, and the IGI also contains records of the baptism of only two daughters.
| Name | Notes |
|---|---|
| Margaret Milnes(1131) | 1793-1881. Married William Stansfield (1785-1835). The IGI, based on parish records as transcribed by the Yorkshire Parish Register Society, records her baptism at Flockton on 27 Jun 1793. |
| Marianne Milnes(8) | 1801-1886. Married Henry Briggs (1797-1868). See her entry above. |
There seems to be rather a long gap between these two baptisms, and I wonder whether other children were baptised elsewhere.
The brief pedigree given in Davidson (1986) gives only that he died in 1776, that his wife's first name was Martha, and that she died in 1763. The IGI has a two competing dates for the marriage of a Richard Milns to Martha Brook or Brooke. One, based on parish records, is 03 Sep 1739 at Halifax, and the other, from an unsourced member submission, is 01 Jul 1741 at Kirkheaton. For the moment, I am going with the Halifax date. The IGI entry is based on FHL film 990597, which is of Bishop's Transcripts for the period 1707 to 1800, though the IGI extraction starts in 1720. There is also an IGI entry for the christening on 23 Mar 1705 of a Richard Milne, son of another Richard, based on the nonconformist register of baptisms, marriages, and deaths generally known as the Northowram or Coley register, which could possibly be him. Northowram is nowadays part of Halifax, so is in the right part of the country.
For children of this marriage, Davidson (1986) shows only their son James, but chapter notes at the end of the book say that Richard had four sons. The notes also say that Richard was a timber merchant and died in 1770. The IGI, based on church records, has entries for the baptisms of four sons and four daughters, all children of a Richard and my guess is that they are all children of this Richard.
| Name | Notes |
|---|---|
| John Milnes (Millns)(1134) | IGI record of his baptism at Flockton on 12 Jun 1743. |
| James Milnes (Millns)(299) | IGI record of his baptism at Flockton on 26 Jul 1744. He married Mary Anne Bell and had two daughters. See his entry above. |
| Mary Milnes (Millns)(1135) | IGI record of her baptism at Flockton on 14 Jun 1746. |
| Martha Milnes (Milns)(1136) | IGI record of her baptism at Flockton on 08 Oct 1748. |
| Richard Milnes (Milns)(1137) | IGI record of his baptism at Flockton on 04 Nov 1750. |
| William Milnes (Milns)(1138) | IGI record of his baptism at Flockton on 26 Nov 1752. |
| Elizabeth Milnes (Milns)(1139) | IGI record of her baptism at Flockton on 26 Apr 1755. |
| Ann Milnes (Milns)(1140) | IGI record of her baptism at Flockton on 12 Mar 1758. |
It is further said in the chapter notes in Davidson (1986) that the brothers worked the Flocton Mine, using rails laid down to transport timber to the River Calder (remembering that their father was a timber merchant) to move the coal. It seems that this mine, which was on Milnes land and had been worked since 1774, provided Henry Briggs, when he married Marianne Milnes in 1824, with his entree into mining.
© John Stowell 2004/2006